US graduate salaries fall by 5%

July 16, 2012
According to a survey by the Association for Legal Career Professionals, salaries for new law graduates in the US fell by 5 per cent between 2010 and 2011, dropping from $63,000 to $60,000. And the median wage for graduates has fallen by 17 per cent since 2009, when it was up at $72,000.

The drop is even bigger when we look solely at graduates in law firms, where the median salary has dropped by 35 per cent from $130,000 in 2009 to $85,000 in 2011.

NALP Executive Director James Leipold said: “Nearly all of the drop can be attributed to the continued erosion of private practice opportunities at the largest law firms”.